


The Long Scream of Winter

by UrbanHymnal



Category: Sherlock (TV)
Genre: Alternate Universe - Fantasy, Angst, Horror
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2013-07-23
Updated: 2013-07-23
Packaged: 2017-12-21 03:21:04
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 821
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/895183
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/UrbanHymnal/pseuds/UrbanHymnal
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>John is a veteran of a near legendary ten long winters on the Wall. Surely he should have heard it by now, they say. Everyone hears it eventually.</p>
            </blockquote>





	The Long Scream of Winter

**Author's Note:**

  * Translation into Français available: [Le Long Hurlement de l’Hiver](https://archiveofourown.org/works/2050056) by [Interrosand](https://archiveofourown.org/users/Interrosand/pseuds/Interrosand), [Quarby](https://archiveofourown.org/users/Quarby/pseuds/Quarby)



> Written for the Let's Write Sherlock challenge 3. The inspiration for this comes from a song titled "To Take the Black" by The Sword, which can be found here: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MjtXEJ64C8I. It is also, as I understand it, a reference to A Song of Ice and Fire, though this is not intentionally connected to Game of Thrones in any other way.

“You ever heard the Scream?”

 

It’s a question John has heard before. Every new volunteer to the Wall, seasoned or wet behind the ears, seeks him out and eventually asks the question. The Scream, the Hollow’s Call, the Winter’s Cry-- whatever new and fanciful name they had managed to come up with didn’t matter; it always came down to the same thing: had he ever heard it? He is a veteran of a near legendary ten long winters on the Wall, surely he should have heard it by now, they say. Everyone hears it eventually.

 

John shifts, tugs at his armour, and tries to ease the pressure on his left shoulder. The pain never leaves, just circles, waiting to pounce. He eases his fingers under the fur and mail and presses them against the cloth just underneath. It does nothing but cause his fingers to tingle and burn as feeling slowly eases back into his fingertips. Just under his hand, he feels long, pale, ghostly fingers digging deep into his flesh.

 

“Sir?”

 

The new ones don’t know when to be quiet. Those that don’t quickly learn to listen to the whistle of the wind, the creak of stone, and the snap of dead branches don’t live long. He gives this one a fortnight.

 

John sighs and glances over at the ranger before going back to his watch. He hasn’t heard the Scream, not the way they talk about it. Some whisper about a baby crying in the night just before the wolves come to rip at its flesh. Others talk about men, still alive but not enough to know that they are already dead, still alive enough to be terrified, all yelling the shouts of the damned, left to be picked and pulled apart by the ravens on the battlefield.

 

But in his years on the Wall he hasn’t heard anything like the stories. No child could survive in this place. The land takes life; it never gives. He has held twisted things in his hands, a mockery of small arms and legs, but no breath, no movement, just stillness that snuffed out shouts and muffled words in crowded rooms. His Mary had-- But no. No child could live here. This is a tomb; there is no home to be found here.

 

And no man is left on the field to die; either they are carried away as nothing more than sacks of meat for ravenous fangs to tear and rend or they are burned by those who survive. Bodies left to rot only attract snapping, slavering maws. There is enough trouble to worry about here than to go begging for more.

 

He knows, though, that there is something out there, more often now than when he first took up a sword. As he stands on duty, in the time just between night and dawn where everything is grey, he hears it. But it isn’t screams, least not like any voice he’s ever heard. In his time on the Wall, he has become an expert on the sounds that a man came make. Terror, pain, despair-- they twitch under his skin, steady his hand when it should shake him to dust.  No, it’s not screams he hears. It’s the shriek of a violin.

 

He knows why he hears that and he sure as hell isn’t telling.

 

“You hear it. You don’t follow it,” he finally says.

 

“That easy?” The girl stares at him hopefully, and gods she is young, probably following her father here, taking the black because there is nothing left elsewhere. Nothing left but an honourable death that will taste of bitter copper and smell of shit and fear. She’s not the first coming to seek meaning only to find desolation, nor will she be the last. He wonders if he ever looked that way at someone; he can’t imagine it.

 

John thinks of honour and of big Murray, who once jumped off the Wall right into the middle of a horde because something got ahold of John and was dragging him back to its lair, a stoic giant of a man who was reduced to crying every night into his pillow until he gagged. He thinks of fear and Dimmock clawing at people who tried to hold him back from wandering out into a blizzard. Of easiness and Anderson quietly slipping away in the night, leaving everything behind save his sword.  All gone now.

 

The wind digs hard into his shoulder, ice grinding into his joints.  “Just that easy.”

 

He grits his teeth and stares into the dark, watching the space in between light and shadow as the sun slowly begins to rise. In the distance, he hears a long drawn out note, shrill, off-key, and angry. It’s getting closer or maybe he just is.

 

 _Not much longer_ , he thinks.

 

The howl of strings echoes across the twisted plain: a threat, a caress, a promise.

  
 _Soon_ , it answers.


End file.
